A recent article in Forbes reported that adult users of electronic cigarettes prefer supposedly juvenile flavors. In a senate hearing last month several senators led by Jay Rockerfeller (D-WV) accused e-liquid manufactures of providing a wide variety of flavors which in his mind, was conclusive evidence, that their purpose was to get children hooked on nicotine.

However, a recently released survey tells a much different story. For example, the survey reported the average age of consumers using Cherry flavors to be in the high 40's. The survey was released by E-Cigarette Forum, an online meeting spot for vaping enthusiast.

Image: E-Cigarette Forum

The survey included over 10,000 members from the forum, 78% which live in the United States. Their ages ranged from 18 to 65 and over, with 72% between the ages of 22 and 54. Only 22% of the participants said they preferred tobacco flavors, while an additional 3 percent said menthol tobacco. So, in fact, three-quarters of those surveyed chose fruit flavors(31%), bakery/deserts(19%), and savory/spice(5%).

The new survey also provides further evidence that e-cigarettes help smokers quit. Eighty-nine percent of the respondents reported that they had smoked at least 10 cigarettes a day before they started vaping, and 88 percent said they were not currently smokers. According to the Forbes article, Those findings are similar to the results of another survey focusing on people who participate in online vaping forums, reported last April in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. That study, which included more than 19,000 vapers from around the world, found that almost all of them (99.5 percent) were smokers when they started vaping. Four-fifths of them had stopped smoking completely, while the rest had reduced their cigarette consumption, on average, from 20 to four per day.

The article goes on to point out the following:

It borders on bizarre that critics like Rockefeller continue to question the existence of those former smokers, even while arguing that e-cigarettes should be restricted or banned based on the entirely hypothetical risk that vaping will lead to smoking among teenagers who otherwise never would have tried tobacco. But what do you expect from a politician who thinks a sample of one—himself—is perfectly adequate to reach sweeping conclusions about a product’s intended use?

The real narrative of this article is that nine out of the ten vapers in the E-Cigarette Forum said they worried that government regulations demanded by save-the-children-alarmist like Rockefeller will remove product they use for the market. With the Food and Drug Administration soon to rule on how to regulate the e-cigarette industry it would be refreshing to see politicians personal prejudices put aside and aspire to a higher standard.